


Imprisoned

by peldarjoi



Series: Despair, Salvation and Love [1]
Category: Star Trek, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Bajorans, Cardassians, Episode: s03e05 Second Skin (indirectly referenced), Gen, Imprisonment, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, Obsidian Order, Occupation of Bajor, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-09
Updated: 2020-09-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:15:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 12
Words: 8,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26381743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peldarjoi/pseuds/peldarjoi
Summary: A member of the Shakaar Resistance Cell finds herself at the mercy of those without mercy."Squeezing her eyes tight against the brightness, she tried to piece together what had just happened and where she was, but her mind was foggy and slow. That was because she’d been stunned, she remembered finally. She’d been on a mission to Cardassia Prime ."
Series: Despair, Salvation and Love [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1917022
Kudos: 6





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote and posted "It's over now, you're home" a few years ago and now decided to give a backstory to it, so this is a prequel to the earlier story.
> 
> Also... I'm not good at torture scenes. I always think "I'm really going to push the limits this time" but end up chickening out. I guess I'm just not that ruthless. The Obsidian Order would have much better torture methods than I can come up with, that's probably a good thing, but we'll just have to get by with what I can do.

Blinding light pierced through Feelee's eyes as she was shoved, almost physically, into consciousness. 

Squeezing her eyes tight against the brightness, she tried to piece together what had just happened and where she was, but her mind was foggy and slow. That was because she'd been stunned, she remembered finally. She'd been on a mission to Cardassia Prime with Delka. 

Delka... 

She'd killed him. 

He was a collaborator. He'd betrayed her to them. That's when she was shot. But it wasn't set to kill. Which meant... 

She tested her arms, they were secured to the chair she was in. 

Her mouth hurt. Her lip was split. Because they'd hit her when she tried to fight them off before they stunned her. 

_Prophets! What would they do to her?_

She turned her attention outward and detected the sound of several people in the room beyond the circle of blinding light. Cardassians. 

Her heart pounded, but she steeled herself against whatever was going to happen. She and Delka had been sent to Cardassia alone, there was no one to come for her and she had no way out. Then a different fear formed in her chest, feeling like her heart would stop. If he'd betrayed her, he could have given them information on the rest of her cell. They could all be dead already. 

Unable to stop them, images forced themselves into her mind of everyone she loved lying dead, slaughtered, in the dry dirt of Dakur. Or lined up and shot one by one. 

She fought for control of her thoughts until cold metal touched her neck, followed by a heady rush of some truth drug. Her already sluggish mind grew even heavier, like her thoughts were slogging through thick mud never to reach their destination. 

"What was your mission?" A voice asked from somewhere far away. 

He had to ask it three more times before she understood the words at all. 

Their mission was to plant a virus in the Central Archives that would create a backdoor the Resistance could use to gain access to classified information. But before those words could come spilling out of her mouth uncontrolled, she said, "We were picking wildberries in the field behind your mother's house." 

Undeterred by her flippant answer, he asked calmly, "Then what were you doing in the basement of the Center for Housing Regulations?" 

"Don't you know? That's where your mother goes to give head to all the waste processor workers." Even in her drugged state, she could hear how she slurred her words. 

"I see." He said, finally stepping close enough that his body blocked part of the bright light and she was able to see him for the first time. Cardassian, as she'd expected. But not a military uniform. He wore a precisely cut, but drab suit. A non-military interrogator could only mean one thing: The Obsidian Order. Any shred of hope for escape evaporated with the realization. 

"Let's try again." He said and she felt a hard object pressed to her temple. "What was your mission?" 

Without giving her time to reply, he switched the device on and pain ripped through her head. She felt herself scream, but the pain blocked any other senses. It shouldn't be possible, but the pain continued to increase, as though her head would be crushed by a slowly constricting vice. 

When he finally turned it off, she sucked air desperately into her lungs with shaking gasps. 

He waited patiently for her breathing to calm, then leaned close again. "What was your mission?" He pressed the device to her temple again. 

She cringed, but he didn't activate it just yet, only waited for her answer with the threat of more pain at the tip of his finger. 

"You see," She started, already noticing a rasp to her voice, "you want to be careful not to pick the unripe berries, because they'll never ripen once they're picked." 

"Of course." He said placidly. 

Pain again, tearing her head apart. She screamed, clawed at the arms of the chair, twisted against the bonds until her wrists felt like they might break. 


	2. Chapter 2

The next time she woke, it was in almost complete darkness with the sound of receding footsteps somewhere. 

She tried to push herself up off the floor, but her head pounded so hard that she fell back down with a pitiful whimper. 

Her face was pressed against the cold, stone floor. It was also damp. Strange for any place on Cardassia Prime to be damp. She finally forced her eyes open against the pain even in the dim light that she found came from a small, barred window set in an old, thick wooden door. 

From her position on the floor, she could make out the door with its window and a gap at the bottom only a couple of centimeters high that cast some more light across the floor. The rest of the room was too dark to even see how big the room was. 

Not far from where she laid was a drain on the floor. She moved slowly and carefully to drag herself toward it. The stone floor around it was crusted with blood and Prophets only knew what else. When she reached the drain, she inspected around the grate, but found that it was set securely within the stones. 

Then she turned her attention to the door, crawling on her hands and knees. In the darkness, she felt around for a lock, but there was nothing on this side of the door, only rough wood that had been smoothed by the hands of some unknowable number of prisoners. She ran her fingers around the entire outer edge of the door, standing on her toes to reach the highest part, but found no weakness she could exploit. 

Her head throbbed from the small exertion and she rested against the wall for a moment. If she couldn't get out of here, what would happen? How long would it take for them to break her? How long could she hold out? Did that even matter if the Shakaar cell had already been wiped out? But the fact that she was here, that they were questioning her and hadn't executed her already, could mean that they were still alive. 

She had to hold out as long as possible. If Shakaar realized she'd been captured, he might be able to make changes so that any information she could be forced to give up might not be useful anymore. That would mean her death, but at least they would live. 

She turned and peered out the window into the cellblock. The three doors on each her left and right all looked the same as hers. The outside of each door was bolted with a slide-lock that looked many centuries old, but still as secure as the day they'd been installed. She wondered if there were prisoners in the other cells or if she was alone. 

Turning away, she felt along the wall in the darkness. About an arms-length to one side of the door the wall turned sharply, then again just beyond were she could touch both walls with her arms outstretched. She followed the wall to another corner and another until she was back to the door. She repeated the process as high as she could reach and down low along the floor. There was nothing but solid stone. 

Dejected, she dropped down to sit on the floor with her back against the wall. She'd only officially been with the Resistance for a few years now, exactly how many was hard to say because it had happened so gradually. Her first mission had been three years ago when she was thirteen, but she'd been with them for a number of years before that. 

If one looked at it another way, though, she'd been with them her entire life. Her parents were members and friends with Shakaar since their childhood and he was like another father to her. Her mother died shortly after she was born and she'd been hidden away for years at safehouses, monasteries and anywhere else they could find. 

Over and over, the Cardassians had tried to find her to use her as leverage against Shakaar. When she was ten years old, Mobara and 'Rys had managed to hack into the Cardassians' computer systems to alter her records. Her DNA now matched her to a false identity, and her original one had been scrubbed from the system. It was at that point that they let her stay with them and began training her to become one of them. 

Now, once again, they were all in danger because of her. 

A door opened noisily outside her cell and heavy footsteps followed. It had to be at least three soldiers. A shadow fell across the window as they stopped in front of her cell and worked to open it. She stood, readying herself for whatever was going to happen. Or, at least, she tried to ready herself. 

The bolt slid out of the latch and the door swung open to reveal three Cardassians, one holding a phaser rifle and two held batons, one of those had a bundle of something in his arm. 

The one with the bundle tossed it to the side while the other one shoved his baton sideways under her chin, pinning her back against the wall. The baton pressed hard enough against her throat that she could barely breathe. She was still drugged just enough that she couldn't put up a fight. 

The one that had had the bundle stepped close to her and she felt cold metal against her neck. He tugged at the collar of her shirt and it gave way under a blade. She grabbed blindly for his hands, but the pressure on her neck increased until her airway was completely cut off. She redirected her efforts at holding back the baton and the Cardassian with the knife continued methodically cutting through her clothing, peeling it away a piece at a time. 

When he gripped the waist band of her pants, she tried to kick him away, desperate to stop him, but the knife was there and sliced a long, shallow wound across her hip. Even so, she continued her struggle while he cut her pants away indifferent to her desperation. Finally, he pulled off even her boots. 

Getting so little air, her vision had narrowed to almost nothing. She felt him reach behind her neck and gather up her hair. He put the knife to it and, with a tug, what was left of her hair fell loosely around her face. 

Only then did the pressure on her neck let up as the Cardassians stepped back. Standing on her own now, her knees buckled and she dropped to the floor, naked and gasping wildly for air. She feared what they would do next but they only gathered up what was left of her clothes and walked out. The one with the phaser rifle kept it trained on her the whole time as though she was any threat in this condition, drugged, naked and almost choked out. 

The door closed and bolted shut, she was plunged back into darkness and finally began to feel the chill across her bare skin and where she touched the cold stones of the floor. 

She began to realize she'd forgotten the bundle that had been in the Cardassian's hand when he came in. He'd left it on the floor. She looked for it and found it just within reach and pulled it over to herself. It was a set of prison clothes. Gray and many sizes too large for her, but it was all she had, so she pulled the shirt over her head and the baggy pants onto her legs and over her hips. There were no shoes so her feet were left cold where the floor had already drawn the heat away. 


	3. Chapter 3

It could have been hours or a day. She had no idea how much time had passed. Her throat and head still ached, so it couldn't have been longer than that. She hadn't eaten since before she was brought in, however long ago that had been. Her feet were nearly numb from the cold floor. She'd tried sitting cross-legged and tucking them behind her knees for temporary comfort, but she couldn't stay in that position for long. 

She heard the outer door open again and tensed. What would they do to her next? 

The next thing she heard was odd, a short scraping or sliding sound. Then again and again. The fourth time she heard it, a tray slid through the gap under her door. It was food! Her stomach twisted with hunger. 

She momentarily considered refusing to eat, but rejected the idea. It would only weaken her the next time she was interrogated. And if she refused too long, they could still force her. 

She moved closer to see what it was and nearly retched at the sight. On the platter was a raw, tentacled and glistening taspar. The creature was native to Cardassia and barely considered edible. 

After initially recoiling, she looked again. Next to the taspar there was a small piece of flatbread and some transparent cubes that she guessed were jelled water. No dishes, no utensils. Nothing she could possibly use as a weapon or tool. 

The bread was barely three or four bites and would provide little nutrition. She didn't know how long it would be until she was offered another meal. She picked up the taspar by the bulbous head and lifted it from the tray, forcing back another heave in her stomach. Its brown tentacles dangled and dripped viscus slim back onto the tray. She swallowed her revulsion and steeled herself. 

After two false starts, she went for it. She lifted it up and dropped it into the back of her throat, choking it down all at once. As it slid down, the tiny suckers on the tentacles stuck to her throat, making it harder to get it down. 

Her body refused to accept it. She bent over the floor drain and gagged, struggling to keep it from coming back up. When she thought she'd gotten through the worst of it, she turned back to the tray for the bread and took several hurried bites to clear the vile taste and sensation out of her mouth. 

She ate one of the cubes and found that it was, in fact water in some kind of solid form. She sat back on her heels to catch her breath, stomach still roiling with disgust. 

Then she realized something she'd missed at first. There were at least three other prisoners here. She'd been so distracted by the sight of the taspar that she hadn't listened for the other three cells after hers, but at least the first three must have had someone there to be fed. 

She stood, still careful not to move too quickly because of the ache in her head, and peered out of the window again. She could faintly hear the sound of people moving around, eating. In all the time she'd been there, she hadn't heard a sound out of any of them. Then she glanced up to the ceiling and saw why. There was surveillance equipment, any attempt at communication would be seen by their captors. 

Sitting back down, she finished her bread and water cubes. 


	4. Chapter 4

They'd come for the prisoner in cell number two after that. Later, she heard him screaming from somewhere. Hours later, they dragged him back to the cell, bloodied and unconscious. She caught sight of some of the other prisoners watching through their windows. In addition to the first three cells and hers, at least cells five and seven were occupied, too. 

Were they all Resistance members like her? She guessed so, given the high security of the place. And the Obsidian Order wouldn't bother with anyone not connected with the Resistance. 

The next time the guards entered the cell block, they came for her. The same three that had stripped off her clothes. As before, one held a phaser rifle on her the whole time. The message was clear, come willingly, or be stunned and dragged out. The other two, who were still only armed with batons, she realized, approached and cuffed her wrists. The one with the phaser kept well out of reach while the other two lead her to the outer door. 

The interrogation room was only a short distance through a corridor made of the same stone as the cells, but more finely cut and finished. 

The two guards directed her to a chair, but didn't bind her to it, only left her cuffed hands to rest in her lap. They moved away behind her, but the one with the rifle kept within her field of vision. 

The interrogator from her first waking moments here approached from behind a glass table in the far corner. 

"I'd like us to have another conversation without the interference of drugs, Ms. Feena." He said cordially. 

She struggled to keep the panic off of her face. He knew her name, her _real_ name. He could use her to force Shakaar to... do what exactly? How far would Shakaar go to save her? How much would he give up in exchange for her? 

"You didn't actually think the Obsidian Order was fooled by your attempt at hiding your identity." He went on. "But don't worry, using you as leverage against some minor resistance band was Gul Ducat's shortsighted scheme." He said dismissively. "Ducat wields a blunt instrument, we prefer the precision of a _scalpel_." 

The way he leaned in close as he said it, sent chills of terror down her spine. 

He sauntered over to lean casually against a console. "What was your mission?" 

She leaned against the back of the chair and clamped her mouth shut. He probably already knew what the mission was from Dekla. He was just trying to get the first admission from her. 

He sighed as though she was being an unreasonable child. "Rest assured, you will be answering our questions whether it's now or after a very lengthy, very unpleasant experience." His expression seemed to reset to that of a reasonable inquest. "What was your mission?" 

When she responded with only silence, he said, "I'm not an unreasonable man. If you'll just answer our questions, you'll find that there's nothing sinister or threatening about them. I'm even willing to send you back home after." 

"Considering that answering _any_ of your questions will no doubt help you destroy that home, I'll decline." 

His voice finally took on a threatening tone. "This is your last chance. Answer the question or we will have to move on." 

"Do you want me to tell you about the wildberries again?" She needled him despite the fear already coiling itself around her spine. 

He made a hand gesture to the guards behind her, just a flick of his wrist and they came back to release her wrists from the cuffs and secure them to the chair instead. Then one of them pushed her head back against the chair's headpiece and wrapped a strap around her forehead that constricted tight. 

_Fighting does nothing_ , she reminded herself, _save your strength for what's coming next._

But still, her urge to fight kept her body tense against the restraints. 

She heard the tiny metal-on-metal scrape from some tool being picked up off of a tray somewhere outside her limited field of vision. When the interrogator came back into view, she saw that he had a handheld device with a tiny mechanical drill bit at the end of it. He turned it on, accompanied by an earsplitting whine as the bit spun to full speed. 

Knowing it wouldn't do any good, she fought to turn away anyway as he leaned over her. 

He forced her lips open and brought the tool closer. 

She fought harder to loosen the restraints, twisting her body desperately, but uselessly. 

"Ah, ah." He scolded. "This will hurt _slightly_ less if you hold still." 

Then he touched the tool to the hard surface of her tooth. Sharp pain immediately shot through her jaw, searing its way down her neck. Her world narrowed down to that tiny point of pain as tears streamed down her face. She wasn't sure when she started screaming, but she did. She screamed until her lungs were empty and her throat was raw. 


	5. Chapter 5

One of the guards shoved her back into her cell hard enough that she fell, barely catching herself with her cuffed hands before her face hit the floor. Then when she turned to get back up, he was already there looming over her and her heart sank, it was going to happen this time. 

He grabbed her shoulder and shoved her down onto the floor. The back of her head struck the floor hard and her head spun like she would black out, but she managed to stay conscious. Then he reared back with his baton and cracked it across her cheek. 

While she fought for consciousness and against the pain, he stood back and unfastened his armor, allowing it to drop to the floor. 

Despite the pain in her head and the side of her face, she pushed backward with her heels, but he grabbed her ankles and pulled her back to him and pinned her down with his body. 

She shoved his chest away, but he grabbed her by the cuffs on her wrists and pinned her arms uselessly over her head. With a sickening lick of his lips, his other hand roamed her body. He found the bottom edge of her shirt and slid his hand up her bare skin, finding her breast. 

She fought and writhed under him, but he continued to squeeze her breast so hard she cried out. That only seemed to excite him more. He left her breast and moved down to pull off her pants, expertly avoiding her kicking legs. 

No matter how hard she tried, he forced his knee between hers. A hard lump pressed against her hip as she struggled and she panicked at the thought that it was meant for her and she couldn't stop it. 

"Go ahead and fight, girl." He said with a sick grin. 

And fight she did, as hard as she could, but he anticipated her every attack. He'd done this before. 

* * * 

Her whole body ached from the fight and the invasion and she turned onto her side with her knees tucked protectively against her. 

He tucked himself back into his pants and walked away with satisfied laughter. Just before he left her cell, he kicked a meal tray into the room, then slammed the door shut and locked it. 

No matter how hungry she was, Feelee ignored the food, only curling her body around herself and sobbed. 


	6. Chapter 6

They didn't give the prisoners much time to contemplate eating before snatching the trays back. Feelee was beginning to regret not having taken the opportunity when she could. 

In his self-satisfaction, the guard had left her wrists cuffed and she guessed she would remain that way until the next interrogation. It did, however give her a hard metal object. She could tap out a message to the other prisoners using a code most Resistance cells were familiar with that assigned varying long and shorts taps and double-taps to the ideograms of the Bajoran language. 

She thought through her first message and began trying to get the attention of the others by tapping in a steady rhythm on the door while watching out the window. When she saw faces appear in the windows of all of the cells, she started her first message: _Where?_

Someone knocked a soft reply. _Cardassia. Under ground._

They were in an underground facility? That would explain the cold and damp. They would have to be very deep or the Cardassian heat would have warmed them. 

Another message, _Who's here?_

But before anyone could reply, the three guards, the only three she ever saw, burst through the outer door. They yanked open cell five and the two with batons marched in. 

All she could hear were the sounds of the man there being beaten terribly. The sickening, dull thuds of a hard object hitting a body, then turning wet as he began to bleed and was still beaten. 

When the man didn't make any more noise, they came out and headed for her cell next. 

She backed away from the door, but there was nowhere to run. 

The door banged open against the wall and the two came for her. The one who had raped her took the first swing, striking her in the same place on her cheek that he had before. 

The next thing she knew she was already on her hands and knees and they let loose on her, beating her with their batons on her back, her legs, her arms where she protected her head. As she began to weaken, one of them shoved her onto her back with his boot and they pounded her chest and stomach before she could move to protect the areas. 

When they had her adequately compliant, they left, slamming the door closed on the way out. 

She curled her body into a tight ball and breathed through the pain. They knew exactly how and where to hit to inflict the most pain without causing too much damage so she could still be interrogated. Whenever that would be. 

Communication was out of the question now. They had not only identified what they were doing, but who was doing it. She longed to reach out to the other prisoners, to find a way for them all to escape this place, but for now, they would have to remain passive victims. 


	7. Chapter 7

The only time they saw the guards was when they took someone for interrogation or fed them and both of those things were at seemingly random intervals. By design, she was sure. She'd lost track of all time. Concepts like months and years had no meaning here. Just long stretches of time between torture, food and rape. 

There was a woman in the cell next to hers, number three. Feelee had heard the now-familiar sounds of her being assaulted. One of the two baton-carrying guards seemed to prefer her and the other preferred Feelee. He would show up from time to time to rape her with his phaser-rifle-carrying buddy to watch his back. 

Sometimes it was long enough between incidents that she was able to heal, but sometimes she was still torn and bleeding when he'd come for her again. She fought back, every time, but always uselessly. He was bigger and stronger than her and she was weakened by starvation and torture. 

Under drugs and unbearable agony, the interrogator had forced her to answer his first question, what their mission had been and that they had not completed it. Then he started asking strange, seemingly harmless questions. About the cell's activities six years ago... or at least six years before Feelee had been captured whenever that was. And personal questions about 'Rys. Her brothers, what she'd told her about her home before she left for the Resistance, the games she liked to play as a child. 

Confusing as they were, she hadn't answered those questions. Or, at least, she didn't think she had. The drugs could have clouded her memories. But since he had kept asking those questions, she felt it was safe to believe she hadn't answered them. 

The outer door opened and she heard the food trays being slid under the doors. One, two, three, then hers. 

She went over to it. It was the same as always, a raw taspar, a piece of stale bread and water cubes. 

She picked up the taspar, closed her eyes and swallowed it down quickly. Then she grabbed the bread to inspect it in the dim light, flicking bits of mold off of the edges and ate it too. 


	8. Chapter 8

Then the monotony changed, but not for the better. 

They took the man in cell one first, then she heard screaming, but not the usual, controlled pain of an interrogation. This was heart-rending agony as he was tormented relentlessly. She shrunk away when they brought him back to his cell. She'd never seen anyone so horribly tortured, she could hardly believe he was still alive. 

Then they went straight to the next cell and took him, too. Tortured near the point of death. Horribly mutilated. 

Why were they doing this? 

Then cell three. When they brought her back, her face had been cut to shreds and from the blood soaked into her clothes, her body was the same. 

Feelee was next. 

She pressed against the back wall, but there was nowhere to go. The guards grabbed her, gathered her wrists into a pair of restraints and shoved her ahead of them toward the interrogation room. 

The interrogator wasn't there. The usually immaculate floor was covered in fresh blood, smeared by boots and bare feet. Torture instruments were scattered everywhere and also covered in blood. 

They shoved her into the room. She slipped on the blood, landing on her knees, and tried scooting backward away from them, but they were in the superior position. One grabbed her by the hair and lifted her up while she struggled to get her legs under her. The other guided a chain that was suspended from the ceiling into the center of the room. 

She tried to push back away from it but the one holding her twisted her hair in his fist until it felt like her scalp would tear and she stopped. 

With her neck bent at an awkward angle trying to ease the pressure on her scalp, she felt her arms lifted and the restraints attached to the chain. Then the one holding her by the hair let go. But relief was short-lived as the chain was pulled tight and her arms lifted over her head. The restraints pulled against her wrists, lifting her up so that her toes barely touched the floor. 

Her wrists, bearing the weight of her body, felt like they would tear apart. 

The one who liked to rape her stepped into her view and began unfastening the clasps at the front of her shirt. 

She squeezed her eyes shut, unsure what sick torment he had planned. 

Once her shirt hung open, he trailed a finger slowly, sickly down her sternum to her navel. She hoped whatever they would do, they would go too far and kill her just to get it over with. 

When he stepped away, she was afraid to look, but opened her eyes anyway and wished she hadn't. The other one handed him something that looked like the small coil heater the vedeks at the Olkirno monastery used to heat water in their cups for tea, but much larger, and it was glowing red. 

She hated the pitiful whimper that came from her own mouth, but couldn't seem to stop it, already feeling the heat off of the thing as he brought it closer. 

The heat intensified to an unbearable amount before it even touched the skin on her stomach, but when it did, the searing pain ripped a brutal scream from her throat. She fought uselessly to pull away as her skin blistered and split, pain clawing through her body. 

* * * 

Part way through, they had given her a strong dose of stimulant to make sure she didn't lose consciousness for every horrifying thing they did to her. When they were finally through with her, they dumped her in her cell, burned, cut, bleeding and in agony she hadn't known was possible. 

Without the ability to pass out, she had to hear the last three go through the same experience. 

She couldn't imagine what it could mean for them to do this, but she had a bad feeling it was more than just the senseless torture of some Bajoran prisoners. Could it be that the Resistance had lost? That they had no more need of them and had left the guards free to do whatever they wanted to them unconcerned whether they lived or died. 

The thought was worse even than the pain. The sorrow that the fight for her home had been lost was too much to bear. If the Resistance was wiped out, there was no hope for her people. Those who remained would be subjugated and mistreated horribly for unknowable, dwindling generations until they would be finally wiped out of existence. 

Her father and the rest of the Shakaar cell. The people who had been like family to her and protected her all her life were gone. She couldn't fathom the immensity of what was lost. Couldn't even cry for them or for herself, all she felt was emptiness. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ** This gruesome event marks the end of the occupation, but, of course, she doesn't know that.


	9. Chapter 9

As suddenly and strangely as it had happened, things went back almost to what they had been. Whatever rage the guards had been under had been reined in by the interrogator who was back again for the torture sessions which were just as vicious, but more controlled. Though, no questions were ever asked any more. 

Maybe they decided they still had use of them after all, she thought. Keeping them in a state of brokenness for some unknown purpose. 

After an incomprehensibly long time of the unbroken pattern of beatings, rape and torture, they came for her yet again. It had been longer than usual since they'd been fed, and she was already terribly weak from hunger. She couldn't even put up a token fight as they hauled her to her feet and lead her away to the interrogation room. So weak, in fact, that she could hardly walk. 

She was strapped down to the chair and she began preparing herself to face what was coming. 

The interrogator reclined behind his glass desk with his feet propped up. "I'd like to talk again about Kira Nerys." He began. 

Her mind, dulled now by what she was sure was years of this, struggled to reorient to the question. Back to questions about 'Rys? That could mean she was still alive. 

"Tell me about her." He prompted. 

"Well, she must be ninety-seven years old by now. Sixteen kids. Runs a shoe shop in the Capitol. Kind of a bitch." The last part was true, but only in the best possible way. 

"I must say, your sardonic attitude is the highlight of my days." He said flatly. "It reminds me how far we still have to go." 

"In fact, she and I used to go wildberry picking together. You remember all our chats about the wildberries." 

The briefest flash of exasperation passed across his face, then he stood and came over to her. Even though the mere sight of him made her want to cower in the corner, she locked eyes with him, challenging him. 

Without his eyes leaving hers, he reached to the side and picked something up off of a metal tray. 

Finally, she broke the stare and had to see what he had. Panic sliced through her heart like a blade. In his gray hand, in the most delicate grip, he held a blade-scalpel. She'd learned never to underestimate how gruesome his methods could be. 

He took hold of her hand and twisted her arm within the restraints so that the tender inside of her wrist was exposed, then he laid the blade of the scalpel against her skin. 

She knew she should look away, but couldn't bring herself to. 

It was only a slight sting at first as he applied minor pressure, but she knew that wouldn't last. The pain grew as he cut away a section of skin so thin that it was transparent. Then the worst of the pain hit when he lifted it away, exposing the skin underneath to the air. She uselessly tried to hold back a strangled whimper. 

Then he started cutting again next to the first strip. "I don't understand why you would endure such pain for such meaningless information." He said casually, watching her face instead of the bleeding stripes he was cutting into her arms. "What nefarious action could we possibly carry out against Kira or anyone else with that information?" 

She squeezed her eyes shut, trying desperately to separate herself from what was happening. 

With more filleted skin exposed to the air, she barely held back the scream, but there was no sign he was going to stop as he began again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ** This lines up with the episode Second Skin. The Obsidian Order is gathering information about Kira's past to convince her that she's a Cardassian agent.


	10. Chapter 10

He'd healed her skin just enough to keep it from getting infected, but left the wound raw enough to be painful through the night. A night in which he left her secured to the chair. He wasn't through with her and the questions about 'Rys. 

Her body ached first from straining in pain against the restraints, then from being unable to move all night. 

She could barely keep her eyes open, but had hardly slept. Every time she'd drift off, she'd be startled awake again at the thought that 'Rys was still out there alive. It was clear that knowing the most mundane things about her was very important to the interrogator, but Feelee doubted she'd be able to hang on for much longer. 'Rys' life and Prophets knew what other lives could be in danger once he broke her. 

But she had no doubt he would. 

Feelee was a piece that had to be taken off the board. The things she knew had to be kept safe, even if that meant she'd have to die. After what she'd been through and what still lie ahead, that didn't seem like such a bad thing any more. 

The door opened and he strolled in, setting a padd neatly on the desk. "Sleep well?" 

"Never better." Then she made the decision, she would make him kill her before she could give up any of 'Rys' secrets. "I suppose you sleep very well after a good, gruesome interrogation." 

"I certainly do when it's a job well done." 

"What turns someone into a sick _tirja_ like you?" She needled him with a vulgarity from his own language. 

"That's very nice, but we're talking about Kira Nerys." He said, unamused. 

"I'd rather talk about you." In all this time he'd been torturing her, she'd been watching him. Learning his tells. They were subtle, but he had them. It was just a matter of pushing the right buttons. 

He picked up the blade scalpel again and she tensed instinctively. 

"Tell me again about her brothers." 

She sucked in a sharp breath of air when he placed the blade between two fingers on her right hand. 

He paused there with it pressed against her vulnerable skin, "Did you have something more to say?" 

She tried to keep her control, but her breaths came in rapid, shaking huffs, waiting for the pain. 

When she didn't answer he pressed in, breaking the webbing between her fingers with a pop and pain that she could hardly comprehend. She screamed. 

Mercilessly, he then sliced down through the tissues, pausing for an eternity before pulling the scalpel free. 

She sucked in a shaking breath. 

"The Kira brothers. Now please." He moved to the next space between her fingers. 

"What about yours?" She forced herself to push. "Did they throw you down in the mud or mutilate your tiny pet _gejor_?" 

"Kira Nerys." The skin broke under the scalpel's blade and pain pierced through her hand again. 

She wasn't sure she could do this. The things 'Rys had told her about her brothers, and her childhood forced themselves to the surface of her consciousness. All it would take was a few words to end the agony. 

When he finally relented again, she gasped for air and forced herself to stick to the plan. "Was it the other children, then?" She heaved between breaths. "Did they beat you up and steal your homework? Spread nasty rumors about the sick things you wanted to do to your instructors?" 

"Actually, I was quite popular with my peers." He corrected gently, moving to the next space. 

This wasn't the right button. 

"Now, back to Kira Nerys' brothers." 

"Was it Daddy, then? Did he withhold his love?" She mocked haltingly. "Did he lock you in a closet and laugh at your pleas until you wet yourself?" 

The miniscule tightening of the muscles around his eyes told her she was finally getting under his skin, though she wouldn't have picked up on it if she hadn't spent so much time with him. She was close, but she hadn't quite hit on it. 

"Or was it _Mommy_?" She narrowed her eyes. "Did she dress you in little girls' clothes because your dick was too small to ever be a _real man_?" She sneered at him. 

He turned, falsely calm, to the guards and instructed, "I believe she needs to remember her place." Then he casually walked back to his desk and feigned ignoring them. 

The two guards were on her immediately, releasing the bonds on her wrists. One of them grabbed her by the arm and jerked her out of the chair to throw her down on the floor with such force she slid forward on the smooth stone. 

A boot struck her in the side, turning her over onto her back. Then a baton hit her jaw, flooding her mouth with blood. She instinctively covered her face with her hands as they beat and kicked her relentlessly. This is what she was going for after all, she thought through the pain, for them to push too far and kill her. But would they? 

They didn't let up until what strength she had gave out and she laid there in a heap. But they weren't finished with her. 

One of them, the one who liked to rape her, lifted her by her arms, nearly limp as a ragdoll. He hauled her over to a console at the side of the room and he shoved her face down over the edge of it. He held her arms down against the console with his full weight crushing down on her wrists. 

The other moved into position behind her. 

She was too weak to put up any kind of fight even if she'd had the will left to do so. 

Groping fingers dug painfully, savagely into her body. She wished he'd just get it over with. Then he did. She bit down on her lip, refusing to cry out. Refusing to give them any gratification in her misery. 

The edge of the table dug sharply into the front of her thighs as he used her harshly, laughing with the other guards as he did so. 

She pressed her forehead against the table, trying desperately to hold back the sobs that threatened to only spur them on. It was only another form of torture, she reminded herself. She could do this. It didn't matter anymore what happened to her as long as she could endure long enough to make them end it for good. 

When he was finished, relief was short. He came around and held her down while the other took his turn. Tears squeezed past her tightly shut eyelids, but that was the only indication of her anguish she would let slip. It was far from the first time she'd experienced this, but they made sure it was as brutal as any. She must stay focused. For whatever unfathomable reason the interrogator wanted the information, she could not allow herself to give it. 

Finally, mercifully, they finished with her and dragged her limply away from the console, unable to even attempt to steady herself. 

They dumped her onto the floor at the feet of the interrogator. Her body, abused and ruined, might be defeated, but she'd scored a victory. She'd pushed him far enough that he'd acted outside of his own procedures. She looked up at him with as much resolve as she could gather. She had to strike now, knowing this could be the last thing she ever did. 

"What? Your dick's too small to do it yourself?" She said through the blood in her teeth, though she trembled inside. 

He loomed over her, just a step closer to the breaking point. 

She chuckled in spite of everything that just happened. "I bet you can't even get it up without thinking about her. Your own mother. All you want to do is show her what a man you can be. You sick fu-." 

Open rage broke through his face and he wrapped his fingers around the back of her neck. He lifted her easily to her feet and slammed her face-down against the glass table. Her head crashed against the thick glass an instant before the edge crushed her ribcage. 

For an instant, it seemed like the table would hold and her body would break, but the table shattered under her and she fell to the floor with the shards of broken glass. 

As the darkness filled the edges of her vision, she looked up to see a hazy view of him standing over her. The dark closed in as she felt something sticky running into her eye. 


	11. Chapter 11

Her eyes cracked open just enough to see the blurry forms of Cardassian boots walk away from her. 

The ringing in her ears was so loud she couldn't even hear their footsteps. 

Then the darkness closed in around her again. 

The last thing she perceived was the cold stone floor of her cell pressed against her cheek. 

She was... alive? 

* * * 

The unmistakable slide of a food tray woke her. Just barely. 

Her face hurt. 

She tried to open her eyes, but there was something crusty covering her face. She reached up groggily and touched it to find that it was dried blood. Patting around, she traced a scab covering a deep wound that ran across her face from her eyebrow on one side to her cheek on the other. 

Finally managing to clear her eyes, she saw a dried pool of blood where she'd been laying. 

The food wouldn't stay for long, so she tried to push herself up off of the floor but a searing pain shot through her chest. She reached down, but only found some minor cuts from the glass. Then, low on her chest, she found the source of the pain. Where her lower ribcage hit the edge of the glass before it broke. She guessed her ribs were broken. 

She tried again more carefully to sit up only to have the pain lance through her so powerfully that her head swooned and she began to lose her fleeting grasp on consciousness. 

More than just the broken ribs, then. 

* * * 

She felt pressure on her shoulder and pried her eyes open just enough to see a Cardassian boot turn her over to lay on her back. 

They watched her groggy movements long enough to be satisfied she was still alive then walked out. 

She heard a tray of food slide under the door once it was closed, but as much as she wanted it, she couldn't seem to make her body move. 

Her heavy eyelids won over her consciousness again. 

* * * 

A food tray again? 

This time she woke more fully, realizing that if she'd been fed at least three times, she must have been out for a considerable amount of time. 

She could think of nothing but the hunger. At least, not until she tried to get up to retrieve the tray. As soon as she moved, the pain from her broken ribs nearly overtook her again. She winced at the pain only to be reminded of the gash on her face. 

She reached up to feel for it. It couldn't possibly have been as bad as she'd thought at first. She'd only been half conscious then, could have dreamed it. But when she touched the scabbed-over gash, she found that it was worse. It ran the same length of her face as she remembered, but it was now swollen, highly sensitive and warm to the touch. It was infected. 

No surprise, but it was worrisome. If her body was too weak to fight it off, she'd die from a simple infection that could be easily treated back home. All the more reason she needed to eat. 

Despite the pain, she dragged herself toward the tray, bit by bit, gripping the rough stone with her fingertips and nails. But it was too far, and she was in too much pain. If she could only reach the edge of the tray, she could pull it to her. 

With the tray still beyond her fingertips, she fought to hold onto consciousness just a little longer, but the world was fading away too fast. 

* * * 

She woke shivering. She had a fever. From the infection? 

The food tray was still just beyond her reach, or was it a new one? Could she have been out that long? She must have hit her head on that table harder than she realized. 

With renewed resolve, she pulled herself the last few centimeters to the tray and slid it closer. Hungerly, she picked up the taspar and dropped it into her mouth, swallowing it down quickly. She had to force herself to slow down on the bread, taking small bites to make it last longer, but it was gone quickly, and the water cubes, too. 

If she could stay conscious and keep eating when they fed her, maybe she could beat this fever, she thought even as she shivered uncontrollably. 

This time, she stayed awake, curling her body against itself despite the protest of her ribcage. This place had never felt so cold. 


	12. Chapter 12

The only way she could be sure time was passing was by tracking the healing progress of the wound on her face. 

Curled up, shivering on the floor of her cell for what had to be days. Then, finally, the fever began to subside as her body fought off the infection. The swelling in her face decreased and finally the wound was able to heal. It eventually became a dry scab that gradually flaked away around the edges to reveal a long scar in its place. 

But it was worth it. As long as her life was teetering on the brink, they didn't interrogate her again. She would like to believe that she'd won, that she'd found the chink in his armor that ruined his authority over her. But she wasn't _that_ good. At best, she'd just made herself less rewarding to interrogate. 

In all her body's fight to survive, though, what had she really gained? This bleak life of nothing but misery? No one could possibly know she was here, there was no hope for rescue. No possibility of escape. As hard as she'd pushed him, the interrogator still hadn't killed her. There was nothing ahead but a void of mind-dulling nothingness broken only by one kind of torment or the other. 

She would never see her home again. Never see her friends. Never eat anything but that wretched taspar. The sky. A flower. Cool water... She would die here in this pit someday after losing every last shred of herself. The final acceptance of that fact was more crushing than the weight of everything else she'd experienced, yet she found she didn't even have enough soul left to cry for herself. 

* * * 

Where she used to actively seek out survival and escape, now she only sat in dark silence. The interrogator hadn't returned, but that didn't mean the torture sessions had ended. The guards seemed to have been left to toy with the prisoners with no apparent objective. She'd been beaten, cut, burned, left in agonizing positions for long periods of time, but never asked another question. She'd have taken comfort in that small victory if there was anything left in her to care. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Read on to "It's Over Now. You're Home" to find out what happens next. Sorry that the title is a spoiler, but, honestly, it shouldn't be a surprise.
> 
> **Also, in case it wasn't clear, the interrogator was Entek himself and the reason he didn't return is because Garak shot him at the end of Second Skin.


End file.
